5 Mental Habits That Steals Years

(NaturalNews) Shocking research published in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism suggests
that chronic stress increases your chance of death five-fold. Beyond
that, stress tends to spoil life along the way. So, we all owe it to
ourselves to get it under control.

One of the best ways to manage
stress is to stop causing it. Here are five common mental habits that
contribute to chronic stress, including what you can do about each one.

1. Self-criticism

Self-criticism
usually shows up in the form of an unrelenting inner voice. No matter
what you think, say or do, this part of your psyche has some scathing
remark to make about it. Even your best intentions can be drowned in a
sea of criticism.

What to do: Listen. It's that simple.
Listen to your critical voice as if it were a friend who had something
important to say. It's amazing what happens when people stop resisting
their inner critic and simply listen, then ask for more.

More?
Absolutely. Hear yourself out. If you are going to make the effort to
criticize yourself in the first place, you might as well make a full
attempt to understand it. Tolerate the criticism long enough to
comprehend the underlying intention. You know you understand it when you
can genuinely appreciate it and take the intended message into account.

2. Blame

The
mother of all relationship issues, blame miraculously keeps you from
having to accept responsibility for mistakes or admit you are wrong.
Alas, the price for such a miracle is steep - you end up miserable. Most
chronic blamers see themselves as victims in a world of incompetent,
unfriendly, idiotic ne'er-do-wells.

To notice when others are
incompetent and unfriendly is one thing. To position yourself as their
victim is another matter entirely. To hold others accountable is one
thing. To resent them in blame is another.What to do: Put yourself in the other's shoes before you make any conclusions. Hold others accountable with compassion, not blame.

3. Autopilot thinking

Medical researchers suggest that autopilot thinking associated with the brain's default mode network creates a ton of mental
and physical stress. When your mind chatters on and on endlessly, it is
not necessarily good for you. A fair amount of body tension usually
accompanies autopilot thinking. Your body is not calm when your mind is
not.

What to do: Engage your conscious mind. Write down
all the autopilot thoughts for 60 seconds or so, then tune it to some
white noise (the hum of the refrigerator, the sound of a fan blowing).
You'll be amazed at how your mind and body calm down.

4. Catastrophizing

Catastrophizing
is taking a stressful thought and running with it to an extreme
negative outcome. For example, you have the thought, I am late for work. Your mind gets a hold of this one and runs away with it. Oh
no, I really am late! My boss is going to be so upset. He is really
getting sick of me, I can tell. I'll probably get fired. Then, I'll have
no money and no one will want to hang around me. I'll lose my home and
end up living under a bridge!

What to do: Write it
down. Rather than resist, just take out a pen and paper. Write down the
catastrophe. This slows down the runaway thought train. Look at it
objectively and acknowledge there is a part of you that is fearful. We
all have fears - this is completely normal. Take a deep breath and move
on.

5. Withholding

This is common among men. Something
bothers them and rather than express it, they suck it up and brood on it
for a few hours to a few days....to a lifetime. Withholding your
thoughts and feelings from others denies them the opportunity to work
anything out with you. It's a passive aggressive punishment that keeps
the withholder in a state of chronic resentment and stress.

What to do:
Express it (maturely). Holding onto grudges and biting back your
feelings requires a tremendous amount of energy. Emotions are physical
and it takes muscle tension to hold them back. Have you ever noticed
someone holding back an emotion? They stop breathing and tense their
muscles, physically blocking the flow of emotional energy. The muscle
tension required to hold back the emotion soon becomes chronic muscle tension. It's exhausting.

Learning to manage your mind is one of the best things you can do for your health!

For
a free, 30-minute strategy session with Mike Bundrant to discuss how
this article applies to you, and to learn about life coaching or NLP
training, please visit this page at the iNLP Center school of personal development.

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